RICARDO GADEA
Hundreds of political opponents of the Belafnde Terry regime in Peru are being held year after year in prison without being brought to trial.
Some of them are charged with acts of "rebellion" that carry the death penalty under legislation rushed through parliament in August, 1965. All of them are subject to brutal treatment and the possibility of being assassinated in prison.
A typical one is Ricardo Gadea Acosta. A journalist by profession, he became interested in the fate of the oppressed masses in Peru and decided to take up their cause. He soon became a menber of the Central Committee of the Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria [MIR].
In April, 1966, he was arrested on charges of having engaged in guerrilla activities. He was interrogated by the police for eighty consecutive hours without being given any food and without being permitted to sleep. Throughout the interrogation, the police threatened to kill him. The 26-year-old leader refused to talk.
Finally he was charged with breach-~ ing the security of the state, aiding foreign powers (the USSR, China and Cuba), and of giving aid and assistance to the
armed struggle of the peasants that broke
out in June 1965.
He was made a special object of
persecution because he happens to be the
brother of Hilda Gadea, the former wife
of Ernesto "Che" Guevara.
In prison he has conducted himself
in exemplary fashion. When Hugo Blanco
was threatened with death, Ricardo Gadea
advocated a hunger strike by all the
political prisoners in Peru and took the
lead in it himself.
His wife, Carmen GAlvez de Gadea,
was arrested immediately after the upsurge
of guerrilla activities in 1965. She was
held in prison for eight months, but was
finally released after a prolonged hunger
strike. The police keep her under sur-
veillance and she can still be brought to
trial.
Ricardo's father and mother are
likewise subjected to pressure from the
police, who keep their home under sur-
veillance.
The case of Ricardo Gadea consti-
tutes one example in many of the need for
an effective and sustained campaign of
solidarity with the political prisoners
in Peru.
TUPAC AMARU